Planetary Exporation Program

Community Menu

With PEP you can explore another planet. However, sometimes you might want to explore want to explore as part of a community. So, PEP provides the ability to more easily collaborate over the internet with other PEP users. With PEP you can create or join a virtual group. Once in a group, your PEP application can exchange network packets with other group members. This allows group members share map icons as well as 2D map views and 3D views across the group.

With PEP's community capability users can explore together. However, it doesn't try to provide all the features you might want. It assumes you will be using a free product like Skype for voice over IP and chat room functions. So, getting a team crew together will likely require both joining a Skype conference call and joining a PEP group.

The community features are both new and difficult to test. Please report any problems you have with these features.

Join Group

The first step is to join a group. Until you have joined a group, none of these menus items have any effect. If you have not joined a group your computer will not send any packets to other PEP applications or receive any packets from them.

To join a community, select "Join Community" and the following window will appear:

Each community must have a unique name. It is assumed that group members will communicate the group's name and password outside of PEP so that each member can type in the required data. Perhaps the group all members will be friends who email the date, time , group name and group password before they team up. Perhaps the group members share the information in a chat room. Perhaps they will find the information on a web site. To join a group you must be connected to the internet.

Accept Remote Arrows and Send Arrows

The other items in this menu define how you will interact with the group. By default, any arrows you draw on your map will be appear on everyone else's map. Also any arrow any other group member draws will appear on your screen. This features allows you to point at a feature. If you're also on a Skype conference call you can use the arrow to point out what feature you're talking about. If you either don't want to send your arrows or receive them from others, just turn these features off.

Map Controls

There are 3 menu options to define how your map view interacts with the group. Turn on "Allow Remote Map Control" if you want others in the group to control panning and zooming you map. This allows one member of the group control all the maps so the group is always looking at the same thing. When "Always Send Map Control" is turned on, every time you pan or zoom your map network packets will be sent to others in the group. If they have "Allow Remote Map Control" enabled then their map will change to match yours.
Finally, when you click on "Send Current Map View" you current map view is transmitted to the other group members. Those accepting map commands will see their maps change.

3D Controls

Currently the 3D view isn't shared like the 2D map view. If you'd like this feature, please request it.

Show Status Window

If you want to check the status of the group you can display this window:

This window shows the names of all the current members in the group, the number of messages sent and received and the status of the group thread. In the above window, a group has not yet been joined so the status is "Not Started". After you join a group, the thread status will be "Running". If case something very seriously goes wrong happens, the thread status could change to "ERROR". In that happens, PEP will no stop communicating with the group. To fix it you must exit PEP, restart it and rejoin the group.

Send Message To Group

With PEP you can also send text messages to other group members.

This feature isn't meant to replace a chat room. However, it is sufficient to send the name of a chat room or Skype conference call to the members of the group.